This Dance We Do
by Louise R
Summary: LexLana, LexChloe. He tells me "I will never love you" in that tone I'm sure he used to save for telling her he loved her.


Title: This Dance We Do  
Author: Louise R  
Disclaimer: Not mine!  
Distribution: Check with me first but I probably won't mind!   
Feedback: Any and all feedback and constructive criticism would brighten up my day immeasurably!  
  
This Dance We Do  
  
"Such a muddy line between the things you want and the things you have to do" - 'Leaving Las Vegas' Sheryl Crow  
  
We never speak of Chloe. But we think of her often, we catch each other thinking of her, something in the downward curve of a lip and the emptiness in the eyes. We see our guilt and melancholy reflected in each other. And we look away, afraid, because we never speak of Chloe.  
  
He almost says her name, sometimes. Gets about halfway through then stops himself. When we're watching tv, curled on his sofa and he turns to me, eyes alight with humour and that wry turn of his mouth, about to make some comment to Chloe. And then his eyes catch up with his mind and, recognising me, he turns back to the tv. My stomach flips as he shifts away, hardly enough to notice, but just enough to hurt.  
  
He has said her name, once or twice, breathlessly when we are in bed together. It feels like a slap on the face. I endure it in silence. It feels like a slap from Chloe's own hand, and it is only right that I should feel it at the height of our betrayal.  
  
I wonder about her, I wonder about them. When we were first together I tried to ask him.   
  
We had been drawn together, the survivors of the mess that was Smallville. We were not ordinary people, we could not live like ordinary people. We were all that was left. We were damned to be together and we clung to each other as the drowning to floating wreckage. We could not let go of the lives that were shattered. We could not let go of one another. We were the only reminder of what we had each wanted to have, wanted to be, and the harshest reminder of those dreams, burned to the ground and never to be returned to us.  
  
All he had said was "You have no right to ask about her. You know that."  
  
And I did know. I have no right because I love him. He hates me for that as much as he wants me, needs me.   
  
I readily adapt to death, it's a skill I had to hone early in life. I feel my whole life has been that adaptation, and so I am indifferent to it. It's neither good nor evil, it's just what I am, and it's just what I've had to do.  
  
So that day I gave up pretending I grieved for Chloe. I had gained something from her death, something I cherished above her. I profited from her absence, now and then, when he sleeps and I feel his hot comforting breath against my neck, I think I might just be glad that she died.   
  
I have sacrificed her, posthumously, for the inheritance that was left to me.  
  
His tongue is paused against his teeth, halting her name before it spills out of his mouth and into the air between us and we actually have to talk about this relationship. Built from the ruins of a tragedy. In moments like this I can't help but confront the fact that he would give anything to have her back.   
  
He would slit my throat as we're making love to be making love to her instead. In moments like this I might even go so far as to say I hate her for that.  
  
And I know he hates himself, too, for this. Hates himself for every time he saw that expression on her face, that one that I always chose to ignore. The one that is this feeling I have now, this second best, never good enough feeling that I hate. That I blame her for. Hates himself for the way she whispered to him that he had made it all better, made it all go away with his healing just for her touches. Made her feel precious, irreplaceable.   
  
Hates himself for loving her so much she finally believed she was worthy of it.   
  
Then fucking the girl that made her hate her own smile, before she was even buried.  
  
And he despises me all the more because she never despised me. When I made her feel this way she took me into her home and called me sister.   
  
Sometimes, I despise myself. I am selfish, in my love.   
  
Still, it's not as if I could ever compete with the love that died for him. So I've stopped trying.  
  
"Why are you with me?" And suddenly I want to know. I really want to know why he wants to be like this, cold and snippy and angry and sad and guilty. The way we are together. Why we do this dance we do, why the more he backs away the more I love him, and the more I love the more he hates.   
  
"Because I don't want to let go of her." And I understand. Even though it hurts him to breathe when he thinks about her. Even though he knows she would hate him for this relationship. This guilt is the only thing that connects him to her now. He betrays her every day, and he feels her with him, scorned, betrayed, right there with him. They are forever bound together by his betrayal.  
  
"You're using me."  
  
"You could walk away. You know I won't ever love you."  
  
"Because you'll always love her."  
  
"That's part of it. But mostly because you never did." He shrugs, and his eyes are cold and his voice is cold and I am made cold all over. "And now, you finally understand what you made Chloe feel. The only difference is, you deserve to feel like you'll never be good enough."  
  
His kisses are revenge exacted in the name of his lost lover.  
  
Because we are saying aloud what has always been there, unsettling the air around us. Because I have always known, really, it is not strange to me that after that we kiss, and we fuck, and it is the complete, stark opposite to making love. He closes his eyes and his touches are meant for a ghost, he opens them and he tells me "I will never love you", in the tone I'm sure he used to save for telling her he loved her. He repeats that, deep and intimate and chilling, over and over, moving inside me, staring into my eyes.   
  
And eventually as he pounds and stabs into me towards his release, he says her name, whispers it, reverent and full of desire, and finally, shouts it as he comes inside my body. It is pitched somewhere between a cry of release and a howl of grief.  
  
When it is over, he is pulling on his clothes hurriedly as if I am his mistress, not his wife. And I will always be the mistress, the more I try to steal his heart, the more I would do, the anything I would do for it, the less I deserve him.   
  
And I am put in mind of a town in flames, and the things we desire that float forever out of our reach as we grasp towards them. This dance we do.  
  
End 


End file.
